Monday, July 14, 2008

what's up the pike: wine and whine

Columbia Country Club has been outed as the anonymous owner of a website for an anti-Purple Line group. The proposed transitway would run through the club's Chevy Chase golf course.

- Barely out of the gate, new anti-Purple Line group Alliance for Smart Transportation has been revealed as a front for Columbia Country Club, with a write-up in yesterday's Post. The Chevy Chase-based club, who's been fighting the proposed transitway that would slice their fairways in half for nearly two decades, sought to bankroll a "grass-roots campaign" opposing the Purple Line.

Purple Line supporters Action Committee for Transit, who discovered the connection between Columbia and the group, plans to hold a press conference outside of the club early this morning. The event will include a guided tour of the transitway's proposed route through the club and a wine tasting.

- Last week's Planning Board hearing to give Falkland Chase historical status went nowhere, says Silver Spring Scene. We won't find out the future of the New Deal-era apartment complex at 16th Street and East-West Highway until September, though the Planning Board is leaning towards a mix of preservation and redevelopment. Falkland owner Home Properties agreed to reconsider their earlier concept for redeveloping the complex's North Parcel, at 16th Street and East-West Highway, aiming for something closer to suggestions made by Planning staff.

Meanwhile, newly minted board member Joe Alfandre excoriates the project's architects for ignoring the precedents for Falkland Chase. "I don’t know where you guys are going with this, but I don’t appreciate the disrespect that you show the Garden City movement," said Alfandre, referring to the 19th-century planning movement that catalyzed modern-day suburban planning. Alfandre's best known as developer of the Kentlands in Gaithersburg. Currently, he's working on the Courts of Woodside, a small townhouse project a few blocks north of Planning Place on Georgia Avenue.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

You must have not been along Wayne Avenue Lately because there are signs brewing up in front lawns opposing the Purple Line Trolley from being built along Wayne Avenue.

Quite Frankley I don't Blame them for Opposing it because it doesn't make any common sense to build a trolley rail through a housing neighborhood along surface streets because it Always runs a risk of accidents.

It will be better supported if they can bury the rail line underground as it goes through neighborhoods and its known that trains travel faster when it is underground.........

Davemurphy said...

How do you get that train from Silver Spring to Langley Park without running it through a residential neighborhood? I'm all ears.

Wayne Avenue is 4 lanes wide all the way up until where it would tunnel to Long Branch. It's not some tiny street tucked away in the backroads of suburbia, it's a major through route between Colesville Road and Silgo Creek Parkway. There are no major traffic backups justifying these extra lanes, and they could very well facilitate a mode of transportation that will prove queter and safer than the busses currently running up and down Wayne Avenue.

I'm highly amused that www.a4stmd.org no longer exists. Columbia Country Club is an affront to the infrastructural integrity of the region even before you factor in the right-of-way that they are currently stealing from the county. dense areas inside the Beltway should be served by developments that embrace the surrounding communities, not exclusive golf courses that shut out the surrounding areas. Great post Dan. It's writing like this that eliminates shenanigans like that from the political process.

Anonymous said...

"dense areas inside the Beltway should be served by developments that embrace the surrounding communities" ...however, those surrounding communities would be rezoned and bulldozed. If the country club is behind this group, it's a dumb move. But there is plenty of genuine grassroots opposition to the Purple Line -- not only for the surface destruction, but its aftermath. If this thing gets approved, homeowners and renters alike will have to fight like mad to hold on to their homes. PS-I am staying anonymous because some of these PL pushers scare me.

Davemurphy said...

scary as I may be, I'm not necessarily a Purple Line pusher

Anonymous said...

Why haven't all these neighborhoods already been bulldozed and rezoned as a result of the Red Line?

I am mystified as to why homeowners will have to fight to hold on to their homes? Nobody makes them sell, even if the property gets rezoned. Look at the Sacks Neighborhood near Bethesda Metro. They got offered $3 million per house, but a minority of the residents refused to sell so the deal didn't go through.

Anonymous said...

Dave Murphy said...
How do you get that train from Silver Spring to Langley Park without running it through a residential neighborhood? I'm all ears.

July 15, 2008 2:49 AM


RE: How the hell did Metro build the Red Line Under Georgia Avenue and 16th Street in Silver Spring and Wisconsin Avenue/Rockville Pike between DC and Rockville????????

Dave Murphy said...

Wayne Avenue is 4 lanes wide all the way up until where it would tunnel to Long Branch. It's not some tiny street tucked away in the backroads of suburbia, it's a major through route between Colesville Road and Silgo Creek Parkway. There are no major traffic backups justifying these extra lanes, and they could very well facilitate a mode of transportation that will prove queter and safer than the busses currently running up and down Wayne Avenue.

July 15, 2008 2:49 AM

RE: Bingo!!!!!! Thats why You People Support building a Cheap Unreliable Trolly along Wayne Avenue just to piss off Drivers that use Wayne Avenue as their thurafare to DTSS by incouraging traffic backups especially when the trolley breaks down on the road way or even worse if a person is ran over by one of the trolley's. All you care about is turning preventing Silver Spring from growing into a Modernize Upscale Urban City like DC, Arlington, Alexandria, Falls Church, Tysons, and Reston because you people want Silver Spring and Most of Montgomery County to be transformed into a retroceed of a Depressing enviroment with Small Depressing Rural Blue Collar Towns with no scenery of Modern Upscale Office Towers, Upscale Retail Centers, and Narrow Roads(I wouldn't be suprise if you people supported turning existing surface roads to Dirt Roads) with no Traffic Lights and only stop signs.......

I am sorry but the Depression days of Silver Spring of the 1930's IS OVER, Accept it or Move out of the area because as long as Washnington, DC is the Nations Capital and Northern Virginia continues to attract Upscale Growth then Expect Silver Spring and other Parts of Montgomery County to continue to Grow and become more Upscale and Modernize with High Paying Employment Growth, Upgraded Multi-Lane Roads, and Upscale Retail and Chain Restaurants.....